Page 19 of Dancing With Darkness

I ignored my son. He’d been saying much of the same thing for the past several hours and I was frankly tired of hearing it from him. From the looks the rest of his coven members were throwing his way I wasn’t the only one tired of hearing it.

A small hand gripped mine in a hold far too strong for Baxter’s age. The boy had lived through so much in his young life, he wasn’t just an old soul — he was simply aged beyond his years. His eyes told a story that claimed he’d never been a child and wasn’t one now.

I recognized it because it’s a look I’d witnessed in my own son's eyes before I’d been taken away from him. It made the back of my throat burn with raw emotion.

He should have gone with Trenton and Simon but once Rain and Finn bailed without a word the boy refused to leave and everyone looked to me as if I were his parent and it was my place to tell him what to do. I wasn’t about to boss him around. We didn’t have that kind of relationship and I respected Rain’s position as the boy's adopted father.

Isobel could also tell him what to do and he’d listen to her, even though she did not see herself as a parental figure to him. They were family, he respected and loved her only second to Rain.

I didn’t know how he could choose one to love more than the other. I loved them both equally. And I loved Baxter the kid too because he was such a big part of their lives.

And, fuck me, I was more than falling for Finn as well.

So many people to love and it was all starting to fall apart.

There’d been a lot of blood in that clearing. Too much blood.

“Someone’s coming up the driveway,” Ariel murmured.

After that there was a rush of people toward the front windows and the door. I didn’t bother getting up and Baxter remained seated beside me, clinging to my hand for dear life.

“What if she doesn’t come back?” he whispered in a broken, little boy's voice I’d never heard come from him before.

I squeezed his hand and closed my eyes tight. It was a damn good question and one I wasn’t willing to answer out loud. Especially not in front of the boy. I didn't want to frighten him.

“Fuck,” Ariel whispered in horror and my eyes snapped open.

Something was happening.

I cleared my throat and my voice came out rough when I asked, “Who’s here?”

I wanted to believe and have hope but there was a pit in my stomach and in my mind I kept seeing all of that goddamn blood. There was no way she’d just be walking up the driveway out of the blue.

The door swung open and Tyson filled the doorway. He held a limp and bloody Isobel in his arms. The look on his face was grim.

Where the fuck were my men and why weren’t they with her?

Slowly, I rose to my feet and since Baxter still clung to my hand I dragged him to his feet right along with me. We stood side by side, frozen, waiting for what, I did not know.

Her pale, lifeless body to move?

An explanation?

Tyson to open his mouth?

Isobel to sit up and tell me this had all been a really bad joke and that’s not her blood all over her body?

So much fucking blood.

“Oh god,” Ariel moaned as if she were in agony. “Is she alive?”

I loved my daughter in law but right then I wanted a hole to open up in the floor below her and for her to get sucked down to one of the seven pits of hell.

“Julian,” Tyson’s voice cracked as he ignored his wife and focused solely on his fellow coven member. “She’s in a bad way and she needs you. She’s bleeding from multiple stab wounds and she’s lost a whole lot of blood. She passed out before I got her out and she hasn’t woken up since. Brother, you have to help her.”

Multiple stab wounds.

Hasn’t woken up.

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